World of Warcraft subscription numbers drop to 6.8 million ahead of Draenor launch annoucement

Swarms of WoW haters inexplicably refer to it as the final nail in Blizzard's coffin

Subscriptions to World of Warcraft continue to drop, with Activision reporting that the player-base stands at 6.8 million as of June 30th. Activision Blizzard reported 7.6 million subscribers during its first quarter financial report back in May, which makes this a drop of 800,000 subscribers in 3 months.

As VG247 reports, the figures were revealed in the latest financial results, which Activision described as similar to the seasonal decline of 2012′s second quarter, when Mists of Pandaria was about to come out.

The next World of Warcraft expansion – Warlords of Draenor – will have its release date revealed on Friday, August 15th AEST, along with the premiere of the Warlords of Draenor cinematic. What with the expansion already having over a million pre-orders, Activision Blizzard probably aren’t too bothered by the decline in subscribers yet.

I am a little mystified as to how a company with near limitless resources at their disposal appears to force a 12 month content drought upon their subscribers each expansion.

Timeless Isle was a pathetic time waste and the very thought of running Siege of Orgrimmar again for the billionth’ time just fills me with rage and self-loathing. It’s no surprise numbers have tanked as much as they have done.

This is very true, but I like to think a company as large as Blizzard has the acumen to allocate resources effectively in a manner which allows for regular updates right up until the inevitable release of the “next big thing”. Other MMO’s (GW2, EQ2) with much smaller teams and budgets manage just that. I see no reason why a behemoth such as Activision/Blizzard cannot do the same. It would certainly go a long ways towards stemming the steady hemorrhaging of its player base.

nekosan: That’s now how I remember it, numbers of active players are always dramatically down until people start “gearing up” for the expansion.

You might want to go and have a look at the graph on MMO-Champion. It does prove what stryker has said in that the last two expansions are the only ones to have a decline in subscribers at the end. Although the last two expansions have also been the only expansions to see a decline in subscribers at all so take from that what you will.

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